Though most residents pay little mind to street sweeping vehicles, they are what keep our roadways and sidewalks clean and litter-free, especially in the springtime when snow banks have thawed to reveal months of hidden detritus.
But, Toronto's thoroughfares are unfortunately going to be looking quite a lot shabbier this season, as the City apparently awarded its latest street cleaning contract to a company that hasn't been able to deliver on its terms.
Rafat General Contractor Inc., privately held and based in Bolton, Ontario, apparently had the lowest and thus winning bid for the coveted contract without actually having the equipment to commit to the size of the job, the CBC reports.
Yikes! Didn't check the VINs on the RFP? That seems amateur and unusual.
— the DOuG's tweets (@schnogger) April 22, 2021
In total, the company — which does specialize partly in road maintenance services like sweeping, snow removal and pothole repair — would have needed at least 12 mechanical broom sweeper vehicles to tackle the entire area of Toronto over the course of this month, but somehow entered the agreement without actually having them in tow.
With the work supposed to have started on April 6 for completion by the 27th, the City has decided to deploy its own teams and trucks for the thousands of kilometres of pavement as part of a general cleaning program that started the second week of April, and vows that it will somehow manage to tackle the issue with existing fleets and resources.
Rafat, meanwhile, could face fines of $100 per kilometre of road it was supposed to have cleaned, as people wonder how the City wasn't diligent enough to ensure that the company was up to the task, especially while glove and mask litter remains such a problem.
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